[center][h2][b][color=blue]Cestus[/color][/b][/h2][/center]
Cestus regretted his choice of job. He had been the first to leave the ship and wasted no time in the seemingly eternal pursuit of items the rest of the crew had asked for. Starting with the most complicated requests and making his way down from there.

The bustling space port was crammed with traders, naval crewmen, all sorts of cargo, helping mechs and androids. If one didn’t know his destination getting lost in the crowds was easy. He finished the medic and engineering demands rather quickly as they had asked for a lot of commonly sold objects but having to hire a helping droid to carry what could not be sent directly to the ship bothered him enough to question his role as it made him feel like a simple errand boy.

After finishing all the crews’ demands he went to his usual food supplier for the bottle his captain had asked for and all the supplies he needed for the kitchen. Cestus’ supplier was a broad man named Robian that kept every kind of food in existence on his massive ship which people usually flooded as anyone who knew a thing about food quality knew he was the man to contact. 

He made his way through the crowds thronging the quay. Crew and happy customers were flooding off the ship, being quickly replaced by another wave of anxious buyers. There were the slipway crews, the excise men in their bicorn hats, the inspectors from the Interior Guard, medium class chefs, high class chefs, second hand suppliers, lowly vendors, hucksters offering guided tours of the so well-known ship, and commercial men and private citizens, who had come up to the station to greet and buy from the ship. 

Cestus shoved his way through the bustle. He could smell armpits and foul breath, the garlic sweat of meat patties on a stove cart who was showing off his recently bought tropical Mangein meat, the burnt sugar of a candy vendor who was also eager to sell what he bought, the ozone coming in off the pier’s atmospheric pressure fields and, behind all other odors, the oddly soapy, rancid fug that hung upon a slipway when a ship exhaled the recycled air that had been wheezing through its oxygen scrubbers for eight months.

Robian’s men chugged past him, hauling trains of crates. A tug boat whickered by overhead, its running lights flashing. The Market, as the ship was called was a juggernaut of pitted rust and seared void plating, sitting up tall in the slip always reserved for it. Service crews always at work, scaling her carbonized flanks like mountaineers on a rockface.

To a regular person it would take hours to get inside the Market and thrice the time to pay and get out but to a well-connected or very regular customer it was just giving a worker a list with what you wanted, the weeks’ passcode, some money and the crates of precious wears would appear on your cargo hold a few hours later like if it was a magic act personally sent and reviewed by the giant and good hearted Robian.

Cestus gave his order to a servitor with a smile “Passcode sir?” the man asked. “XR7M521,” Cestus responded. The servitor watched him wide eyed as he recognized the first priority free order, just sent to Robian’s family. The small man bowed and went on his way, running as fast as he could. 

Cestus was proud of being in such a prestigious position on the (literal) food chain. He had earned Robian’s respect and friendship when he was still a slave one day cooking in a diplomatic event his master was hosting. His master had hired Robian to cook for the event and had put all his slaves to assist him. It was then when Cestus amazed the chef so much he even tried to buy his freedom so he could come and work with him. Cestus refused so Robian promised that if he ever gained his freedom he would help him in any way he could, this free supply of food was the result of that. 

Thankfully this fact was unknown to the captain and the Loadmaster could gamble away his captain’s money. As he traversed the station towards the largest casino it housed, Cestus' thoughts couldn’t help but deviate towards the rest of the crew.

First he thought of the artificial, he was unsure what to think of them as the only ones he had ever interacted with were combat droids he used to train and pulverize. Then he thought about the burnt fellow, he was kind hearted and was always thankful of the food he served. Speaking of appreciation of cuisine was their captain, always cheerful, elegant, and respectful the man was a true leader and Cestus would gladly follow him anywhere. 

As for the other humans Cestus felt a weird attraction to both of them. Kyo he found beautiful but in a crazy scared of her toughness way. As for Janet despite the burned face and her strictness he found her very attractive sadly he hadn’t had time to speak to her but certainly would love to get to meet her.

It was a short journey from The Market to the dock where the imposing casino was located on. A narrow promenade, lined with ferns and intricate statuettes, quickly gave way to a wide plaza with multiple exits. The cook, who was deep in thought, took the western fork that would eventually lead him to the dock.

Turning a corner, Cestus was hit square in the chest. The impact, though surprising, moved the man not at all. He stared down at what had struck him. The large man was surprised when he saw it was Janet herself. Destiny has an odd way of working, he thought as he apologized and greeted her. Seems I’ll need to pocket these credits and postpone my visit to the tables, Cestus concluded as he made small talk with the woman, tying his best to not show so much his obvious attraction towards her as he moved the subject of conversation towards the rest of the crew and the fuel he had just bought for her.

They had been talking for a while when they received the Captain’s warning. Cestus’ first reaction was to look around as he turned off the safety of the gun he carried around. Cestus had been trying his best to keep the small talk fluid and interesting as to not seem dull but he wasn’t sure at how to hint at what he truly wanted so he saw fit to end it and try later after researching on the basics of courting. 

“The captain sounds serious. I think it’s better if we head over to the bar right now and avoid any unnecessary trouble,” he said as he rose from the bench the two were talking in and offered her a hand. It was then when he noticed the five men approaching them, knives visible. 

Before the would be attackers or even Janet could react Cestus had already pulled out his gun and emptied his mag on two of them. Their bodies hadn’t touched the ground when the large man charged at the others.   

He lunged at the nearest one and quickly knocked him down. The thug, half-conscious due to the brutality of the impact the massive bulk had caused, crawled on his belly in a vain attempt to get clear of the ebullient cook.
“We’re not done yet, fool,” Cestus said, clamping his massive fist around the attacker’s ankle and swinging him across the air to smash into one of his friends. The man quickly took off his companion and with his knife lost because of the collision bare handedly attacked. 
Cestus ducked the clumsy two-armed bear hug aimed at him and used the man’s momentum to trip the goon hard onto his back. As expected he lost consciousness when he came crashing against the ground.

The last one had been smart to wait as he lunged with his knife at the cook’s exposed back and tried to bury the blade into the seasoned fighter’s rear but Cestus was ready and merely sidestepped, allowing the man to stab at the air, before delivering a punishing uppercut into his cheek and subsequent hammering elbow into his head, crushing the man’s skull.

The fight took only two minutes. “I don’t know who our beloved captain pissed off but they are pretty serious,” he told Janet as he showed her one of the obvious professional looking blades the men had tried to use. He began to think about how to reach the bar as fast as possible while he loaded his gun when he remembered death squads worked in sixes and there were only five bodies on the floor. 

Realizing what that meant too late to save both of them he ran towards a confused Janet and pushed her out of the way as a high caliber shot grazed his arm. Bleeding badly from the wound he somehow managed to fire back and kill the man hiding nearby.

“Captain we were attacked by pros, what the hell did you do?” he cried onto the communications device. “I think those were the last of them but I can’t be sure. We’ll meet you at the bar but you have a lot explaining to do,” he checked his bruised arm and saw the wound had already infected. Shit they must have dipped the bullet in some kind of paralyzer or poison, he thought as his lights were going out.

“Janet, please pour the Kongi Whiskey I bought for the Captain into my wound and take me to the doctor at the bar if it isn’t too much of a problem,” the herculean man managed to say before collapsing.